Costs and benefits of in-company vocational training
The 'dual' vocational training system (which combines part-time schooling with practical work experience) makes an important contribution toward ensuring the German economy's competitiveness and young people's future prospects. For most youths, it provides an avenue to skilled employment and creates a foundation for life-long learning. And for enterprises, dual vocational training continues to play a vital role in ensuring a supply of young skilled labour and maintaining their innovative capabilities. At societal level, dual vocational training is an important instrument for dealing with social and economic change.
Information regarding the costs and benefits is of fundamental importance for countering the dual vocational training system's possible loss of attractiveness for companies that provide such training. The reason: The expected cost-benefit ratio of the training a company plans to provide is a major factor determining the type and number of in-company training places offered. The more favourable the cost-benefit ratio is for the respective company, the more likely it is to be willing to invest in in-company vocational training.
In order to determine the costs and benefits of in-company vocational training, this research project will survey approximately 3,000 enterprises that currently provide vocational training. A survey of enterprises that do not provide in-company vocational training will be conducted parallel to this. The latter survey will also cover the training and recruitment strategies that these enterprises use and their reasons for not providing in-company vocational training.
